Seven ABVP members detained for disrupting lecture

PUNE: The Cantonment police on Saturday detained seven members of the Akhil Bhartiya Vidhyarthi Parishad (ABVP), the student wing affiliated with the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh, for disrupting a lecture by human rights activist Binayak Sen at the Azam Campus assembly hall in Pune Cantonment.

The ABVP members were detained for shouting slogans against Sen saying that "he is a leader of naxalites and should be sent back," said senior police inspector Sushama Chavan, in charge of the Cantonment police station. According to Chavan, they were detained to prevent them from committing a cognisable offence under section 68 of the Bombay Police Act.

The ABVP members charged at Sen when he was about to light the lamp, but were caught by security personnel and whisked away in vans. Reacting to the development, Sen said that he sympathised with them but was critical of their approach to dissent. Sen praised the college authorities for showing courage against the threats issued by the ABVP.

Sen is scheduled to deliver a public lecture in the city on Sunday evening. City-based organisations Lokayat and Dr Binayak Sen Muktata Samiti have strongly condemned ABVP's threats to oppose and disrupt Sunday's lecture.

"The ABVP is basing its wild and baseless allegations on Sen on the charges of sedition leveled by the BJP government in Chhattisgarh. It ignores the fact that in April this year, when Sen's bail application was moved in the Supreme Court, the SC dismissed the sedition charge within minutes and immediately ordered his release on bail," said a press release issued by Lokayat.

Meanwhile, the venue for Sen's Sunday lecture has been changed to Shramik hall near the PMC building from Lokayat hall. "The venue was changed following threats by the ABVP. It is an honour for Pune to have Sen deliver a talk in the city. Puneites should listen to his views, his experiences of upholding human rights, and his appeal, and should not be carried away by misleading propaganda against him. The threat to disrupt the public lecture by Sen is in contrast to the city's tradition of listening to the views of such distinguished guests. We appeal to all democratically minded people to condemn this threat and attend Sen's lecture in large numbers," the press release said.